SNOT GIRL SUMMER
!this is not a drill!
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***Trigger warning - this edition of Gangletown includes graphic descriptions of snot, mucus, sinus pressure, sneezing, and phlegm. If you are sensitive to such vulgarities, please exit the letter now, and fuckin’ pray for me.***
Spring.
It is, perhaps, one of the most highly anticipated moments of the entire year, every year, in the New York culture. For those that have never experienced it first hand. There is truly nothing like New York in the spring.***
The streets become filled with possibility, freedom, sexual tension, and hope as the first glimpses of warm weather wash over our up-til-now sun-deprived skin. The initial hit of Vitamin D that we feel is more intoxicating than any cocktail, blunt, or bump that we may have become too used to during the previous eight months of forced isolation. On every corner, we see people of all genders shedding the heavy layers of clothing and trading them for shorter, smaller, and flowy-er options. Skin is exposed, libidos are turned all the way on (people are horny, y’all), and shoulders and kissed pink by the sun.
This year, there is one thing in particular that stands out as anomalistic, though. No, I am not speaking about things finally starting to return to “normal” again soon because the fear of Covid-19 has gone down. Sure, that is notable, but there is something else stealing focus this year: allergy season.
Just a few short weeks ago, the same people galvanized by the sun began to capital-S Struggle because of the season change. Mentally, they had just begun to thrive and, for those newly vaccinated, started celebrating the ability to embrace each other without modification. But physically, their nasal passages were being filled with nightmarishly large amounts of multicolored gunk. Covid who? Allergies and their relentless intensity were the new talks of the town. We went from cable-knit to tank top in less than a beat, and we were also sneezing…directly into our masks.
Have you had the pleasure of feeling a thick layer of snot cover the inside of your mask at a moment that leaves you entirely unable to do anything about it?
For a while, I was the exception. I saw the sneezing, the sniffling, the congestion, and itching eyes, and I thought, “Huh, I’m totally fine. I must be a very good person. I’m being blessed!” Look, I’m not usually immune to allergy season; I have a very reliable sinus infection that comes around annually that makes me want to join a suicide cult. This year, though, I wasn’t having any of the common symptoms. I don’t know why! Just lucky, I guess.
When my husband Blaine got taken out by the allergy plague, I almost felt bad for not being a part of the struggle bus with him. He seemed deeply uncomfortable. I did what I could and slept on the couch so he could spread out and sneeze with abandon, but overall, there was very little to be done.
Needless to say, I got cocky. Anytime someone would bring up how bad their allergies were this year, I would comment about how I’d been unaffected and tell them how great I was doing. I hadn’t even gotten my annual sinus infection. I’d send a shrugging emoji and return my focus to the essential things spring provides, like all of the newly exposed thighs! Then, it happened. Two Sundays ago, I woke up with the tiniest little sore throat, and a slight headache, and a stuffy nose. I knew right away.
I could feel bazillions of tiny demonic little allergens working their way through my system in an attempt to tear it all down. My nose became more and more stuffy by the literal second. While walking the dog, I started to secret a constant stream of wet goo from both nostrils. If I wasn’t sniffling in, the fluid was flowing forward, and I knew it was going to be bad.
On that first day, it got so disgusting that I had to abandon my face mask altogether and repurpose it as a tissue. I wasn’t prepared! Keeping my six+ feet from the other neighborhood dog parents, I’d casually wipe my nose every second, hoping that no one would call me a leper and throw things at me.
By Tuesday, the inner depths of my sinuses had become so outraged with the state of things that they greeting me with a full-blown sinus infection. Ah, my old familiar lover! The easiest way to describe the pain of a sinus infection like this one is to imagine that you’re able to experience being both flubber and a voodoo doll physically. It is as if you are made entirely of gelatinous green gunk, and also, you’re being stabbed in the face with thousands of tiny needles. Also, an elephant is sitting on your head.
Here is actual footage of me waking up on Wednesday morning:
Can we please take a moment and talk about how much I truly *hate* snot? Like, hate. Hate. It makes me gag. It makes me want to vomit. It makes me want to die. It makes me doubt my commitment to Sparkle Motion. I feel the same way I do about snot as I do about the GOP; I get that it’s there, but I want nothing to do with it.
I guess the one redeeming thing about snot, and mucus, in general, is that I can respect its function. Like, thank you, mucus, for trying to protect my body from dark materials…thanks…But also, ewwwwwwwwwwwww.
INTERMISSION: I tried to search for another gif by typing “snot gif” and had to take a seven-hour break from writing this piece because I almost hurled.
This week, I have seen more gak, slime, snot, mucus, flubber, grime, jello, blob, trash, grossness come out of my face than I ever imagined could be humanly possible. My sinuses are doing The Work. Honestly, I have to give it up to them because they’re fighting the good fight. They’re out there, being like, ‘You a pollen? BACK UP!” Then they snot on the pollen. My sinuses are being attacked, but they are holding the line. I want to know where my sinuses got their Adderall because they are fuckin’ focused and generating RESULTS.
On Friday, after about 900 tablets of pseudoephedrine, things seemed to be improving a little bit. I ducked out to the Poconos to spend the weekend in the trees with Tralen and Randy. When I got there, though, it was as if the trees were waiting for me, ready to pounce. At one point, I sat outside with my computer, thinking, “Oh, it’s finally warm. It’ll be so nice to sit out here and do some work.” Wrong. So wrong. The pollen, dust, tree-jizz, and darkness coming from these coniferous villains were visible. VISIBLE. In the air. I could see it with my horrible eyes. It looked like it was raining pollen. If I swiped my hand through the air, I could cut through it like a curtain. It took less than five minutes for me to realize that I had to go inside, or I would literally die.
And y’all. It’s not over. I still sound like I've swallowed Alex Mack. It’s like someone put itching powder into my eyeballs. My nostrils may never rehydrate after having been wiped with millions of tissue and toilet papers. The plumbers at our building will think that we have been hosting 24/7 group sex parties because of all the gunk in the sinks! Except it’s not cummies! It’s snotties!
If this doesn’t end soon, my hot girl summer doesn’t stand a chance. I’ll just be here at my apartment. Alone. Staring out the window, secreting goo, hoping someone laughs at my “snot girl summer” joke.
*beep beep* Tangent! Why aren’t the names of seasons capitalized? Every time I write anything - anything - with mention of a season, my impulse is to capitalize it. And you know what? I think that whoever made up these grammars and rules and stuff is wrong on this. If I am writing, “It was a beautiful spring…” that shit looks wrong. Shouldn’t it be “It was a beautiful Spring…”?
Whatever, I’m right about this, but I’ll let Grammarly tell me what to do because I’m trying to embrace being more submissive at times. Have a great spring. Thanks for reading. Ugh.
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Funny as snot!! Ewwww!! Tree-jizz?😷🤦